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__NOEDITSECTION__ These news are mainly copied from Rec Room News on Steam. See the News Archive for older news. See the Timeline for an overview of the development of Rec Room. See Upcoming Events for future community events. Rec Room UPDATE - the “Gifting” Edition! March 14, 2019 - magglerock It's good to be back! Thank you all for your patience while we worked out the kinks in this update; there's a ton of new stuff, and we can't wait to share it with y'all... so let's get to it! You can now send Gifts to your friends! This has a been a much-requested feature, so we’re excited to get it out there! The important details: *Anything you can buy with tokens, you can now send as a gift (if you are over level 15)! *Navigate to Watch > Store and find the item you would like send as a gift. Choose "Give as Gift" and select the friend you would like to send it to! They’ll receive a nicely gift-wrapped box. *You can choose to make your gift anonymous if you like *You also cannot give someone something they already own! A few updates for Screen Mode: *Revised login and registration flow for Screen Mode players. Much cleaner and more sane (we hope). *Loading screen tips between rooms - all kinds of helpful info here. This is something we plan to bring to VR as soon as possible, but for now if you’d like to see the loading tips you’ll need to boot the game in Screen Mode. Which is now easier, because... *Launching in Screen Mode is now supported natively on Oculus. In your Oculus Library, click on the “...” and choose “Start in Desktop Mode” This update is also includes a bunch of new stuff for Creators. We are really excited about this… As we’ve mentioned a few times in various AMAs and forum posts, a bunch of the AG team (including most of the art team) is very hard at work optimizing Rec Room for some exciting new platforms. This means that we’re currently limited in our ability to do things like “make another JumboTron” or “update Rec Royale”. Thanks for being patient with us here, we know the updates are little slower during this phase =] So, with the art team otherwise occupied, we got creative with the Creation tools! Basically we went all in on having our AG designers have build a #community room! The magnificent @ry-guy and the wonderful @meriesa teamed up to build ^CapturePoint, a new PVP-style room where three teams battle to control the Capture Point in the corridors and catwalks of faraway Star Station. This was a really fun and interesting exercise for us. ^CapturePoint is built using only tools that are available to you - yes YOU! It’s also copyable, so you are welcome to remix it, learn from it, improve it, etc. We’re also sharing a bunch of the stuff that got built as inventions that you can bring into existing rooms. Now, we did cheat a little bit. As @ry-guy and @meriesa were building, we also added a bunch of new Creation tools… based partly on what was needed for ^CapturePoint, and partly addressing some long-standing requests from creators. Here’s an overview of the new Creation tools in this update. Ready? Strap in because it’s a long list: First, we've added a new Games Rules chip! *This chip exposes a bunch of the internal Rec Room game systems for use in your rooms. *This includes stuff like health/damage, HUDs, reviving rules, spawning with/without various kinds of equipment, team radios, etc - in all there are 19 pages (!) of settings for you to tweak! Check out the details here! *Note you can have multiple Game Mode chips in your room. Each one will appear as a mode on the scoreboard. The mode selected on the scoreboard will correspond to the active Game Mode chip. *You can find the Game Rules chip in Maker Pen > Palette > Gadgets > Other Gadgets (and use the Maker Pen "Configure" tool to access the settings). * Note that existing rooms will automatically have a Game Rules chip added to it, as that’s how the system works now. The Game Rules chip will be near the spawn point for the room. If you have trouble finding it, or run into any trouble with the Game Rules chip, please email support@againstgrav.com and include “Custom Room Issue” in the subject line. We’ll get back to you as quick as we can. You’re also welcome to ping us on Discord/Reddit/wherever. We want to help! Next, we're stoked to introduce the State Machine chip! *This chip makes it really easy to manage any kind of state behavior - whether it's as simple as "door open/door closed", or as complex as managing the states for a custom game mode. *Find it in Maker Pen > Palette > Gadgets > Other Chips. The basic flow for using the State Machine is to place the State Machine chip, then add States. Use the Wire tool to set the default state, and to define which states connect to which other states. You can also use the wire tool to connect things like buttons or trigger volumes to the state transitions. Basically, use the Wire tool to connect everything together. *The State Machine chip is extremely powerful; we recommend anyone interested in implementing custom behaviors check it out! We've also added the ability to pack your circuits into Circuit Boards! *This makes large, unruly collections of wired-together chips into a single neat Circuit Board object. *You can pack/unpack circuits using the same "Edit/Done Editing" flow as editing Maker Pen shapes. *Circuit Boards also let you protect your circuits when sharing them as an Invention - if you include a Circuit Board in a "Use Only" Invention, other players aren't able to unpack it. *To create a Circuit Board, use your Maker Pen to Select several Chips, click ... to open the context menu and select "Create Circuit Board"! But wait, there's more! We've updated the shape bevels (i.e., what the edges look like when you're drawing shapes)! *Shape bevels are now "smart" - they are not simply scaled with the shape. The net result is that large shapes now have sharper edges, a much requested adjustment. *This will not affect existing rooms, but newly-created shapes will have the new bevel behavior And we've upgraded the Audio Sampler: *You can now specify start and end offsets for much tighter control over your sounds. *You can also specify which channel it will play through (SFX, music, voice, ambient). * Screens players can now record audio samplers and holotars using the context action button. Whew, almost there! We also tweaked and added a bunch of other creation stuff, including: *There's a new Beacon object, perfect for highlighting objectives in your games! Place and scale it like any prop, then you can use circuit inputs to dynamically control the height, color and visibility of the beacon. *SFX chip now has a volume setting in its Config menu. *There's a new "Player Revive" chip. It works like the Player Hit chip - it sends a circuit signal (including player ID) whenever a player is revived. *Breakable objects (like plates, bottles, jugs) now respawn by default (if you want them to break forever, tweak that setting in the new Game Rules chip). *Laser weapons are now the PvP-tweaked Laser Tag variants (rather than the Jumbotron variants). This won't affect existing placements, but new placements will use the new variants. *Trigger volumes are now player role-aware. *Teleport distance and walking jump height are now configurable in room roles. Plus a bunch of bug fixes, including: *You can now cleanly exit the app! No more force close =] *Fixed issue where there could be messy graphical glitches on photos. *Fixed bug with weapon reloaders getting "stuck" inside trigger volumes. *VR players can directly unequip avatar items in the dorm again (sorry about that). *Screens players can directly equip/unequip costumes using the context action button. *Screens players can record holotars/samplers using the context action button. *Audio samplers now correctly support 0 volume when circuit-connected. *Fixed maker pen targeting for audio samplers and object respawners. *Respawn point object default to landing directly on it, with configuration option to smart auto-choose within an area. *Added tooltips for connection tool in screen mode. *Removed "flicker" behavior from looping holotars. *Added Shield to Player Stat chips. *And more! Whew, this is a big one. We’ve done an unusually large amount of testing (for us) to make sure existing rooms aren’t negatively affected by these changes, but if you do run into any issues, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us. Please email support@againstgrav.com and include “Custom Room Issue” in the subject line. You’re also welcome to ping us directly on Discord, Reddit, etc. We want to help! Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://www.againstgrav.com/community/ Thanks for playing Rec Room! As always, don't hesitate to give us your feedback =] The Game Rules chip and what you can do with it! March 9, 2019 - Carthage Hey everyone! We're still working on getting the next update ready to go, but we thought it would be fitting to give you all a deeper peek into one of the new features which /u/gribbly mentioned a few days ago - the new Game Rules chip. Placing these chips in your room lets you define different game modes which can be rotated through on the scoreboard (just like how Paintball, Disc Golf, and Charades let you toggle between their different game modes) and gives you the ability to change a ton (19 pages!) of settings about how those games work. Gribbly's post has some details at the bottom about how this will work for existing rooms. Broadly speaking, we don't think this new system will cause issues for most rooms and ideally, any rooms which are broken by this change will be able to be fixed quickly by tweaking a few options in the Game Rules chip. With that in mind... we thought you might be interested in seeing the list of options you'll soon have access to to customize your rooms. Here's everything that's now tweakable: *Mode Name - sets the name of your gamemode on the scoreboard *Manual Game Start Min Player Count - How many players need to be in the game before the "Start" button on the scoreboard lights up? *Manual Game Start Min Team Count - How many teams must have players on them before the "Start" button on the scoreboard lights up? *Manual Game Start Min Team Size - How many players must be on each team before the "Start" button on the scoreboard lights up. *Automatic Game Start Supported (Toggle) - Should the game start automatically when certain conditions are met? (Like Rec Royale Squads) *Automatic Game Start Min Player Count - How many players must be in the game before it starts automatically? *Automatic Game Start Min Team Count - How many teams must have players before the game starts automatically? *Automatic Game Start Min Team Size - How many players must be on each team before the game starts automatically? *Play Pre-Game Voice-Over (Toggle) - "Press the start button on the scoreboard to play" *Play Results Voice-Over (Toggle) - "You win"/"You lose" *Play Game End Countdown Voice-Over (Toggle) - "5...4...3...2...1...Game over!" *Game Start Countdown duration - How long until the game starts after hitting "Start" on the scoreboard *Game End Countdown duration - How long the scoreboard stays on the results page until allowing the next game to start *Respawn on Game Start (Toggle) - Trigger respawn for players when the game starts *Respawn on Game Over (Toggle) - Trigger respawn for players when the game ends *Join In Progress Supported (Toggle) - Can players join an in-progress game? *End Game If Start Requirements Not Met (Toggle) - Should the game end if too many players leave / there aren't enough players on each team anymore / etc? *Team Count *Team Size *Team Selection Method (Random/Smallest/Largest/Score) - How do we decide what team to put someone on? (Teams can still be reassigned with circuits) *Team Change During Game Supported (Toggle) *Respawn on Team Change During Game (Toggle) *Explicit Team Selection Supported (Toggle) - Can players choose exactly which team to join? (like Rec Royale Squads) *Show Open Slots on Scoreboard (Toggle) - Should the scoreboard add more slots as players join, or always show all of them? *Team Outfits Supported (Toggle) - Jerseys *Teammate Beacom Method (Hide/Show/Revive Available) - When should we show beacons for your teammates (Rec Royale Squads uses "Revive Available") *Opponent Beacon Method (Hide/Show/Revive Available) *Team Radios Supported (Toggle) - walkie-talkie support (like Laser Tag and Rec Royale) *Team Radio Volume *Team Radio Enter Distance *Team Radio Exit Distance *Max Health - This limits what a player's health can be set to (including by circuits) *Max Shield - This limits what a player's shield can be set to (including by circuits) *Suppress Weapon Damage (Toggle) - If disabled, the game will automatically lower a player's health when they are hit by a weapon. existing UGC rooms, this will be defaulted to on, since we know any health management you're doing is already in place using circuits. *Auto Heal Supported (Toggle) - Should players regain health if they haven't been hit for some time? *Auto Heal Delay - How long before players start regaining health? *Auto Heal Duration - How long should players regain health for, once started? *Auto Respawn Supported (Toggle) - Should players automatically respawn after being eliminated? *Auto Respawn Delay - How long after being eliminated until players respawn? *Restore Health on Respawn - Put player health back to maximum when respawning a player *Respawn Invincibility - How long is a player invincible after respawning? *Revive Mode (Off/High five/Handshake) *Revive Required Delay - How long after being downed until a player can be revived? *Max Revive Health Normalized - When revived, what is the maximum fraction of the max health a player can get? *Min Revive Health Normalized - When reviveed, what is the minimum fraction of the max health a player can get? *Revive Health Multiplier Normalized - Defines how the revive health amount decreases with each successive revive. (Like Rec Royale) *Pickup Equipment on Revive (Toggle) - Should a player's equipment snap back to their hands when they are revived? (Like Quests) *Reviver Invincibility Duration - You revive your friend. How long are you invincible for? *Revivee Invincibility Duration - You revive your friend. How long are they invincible for? *Handshake Revive Required Duration - How long do you have to hold that handshake? *Combat Outside of Game (Toggle) - Enable combat logic even when the game hasn't been started. *Team Friendly Fire (Toggle) *HUD Enabled (Toggle) *Opponent Player Health Bar (Toggle) *Teammate Player Health Bar (Toggle) *Teammate Player Health Bars Always Visible (Toggle) *Grayscale Effect When Out (Toggle) *Damage Red Flash Effect (Toggle) - the red flash at the borders of your vision when you are damaged *Hit Feeedback (Toggle) *Revive Feeedback (Toggle) *Downed Feedback (Toggle) *Downed Opponent Feedback (Toggle) *Downed Teammate Feedback (Toggle) *Team Spawn Point Selection Mode (Cycle/Team/Visibility/Random) - How should the game pick which spawn point (of the correct team color) to use? *Spawn Main Hand Equipment Type (a whole bunch of options) - What spawns in your main hand? *Spawn Off Hand Equipment Type (a whole bunch of options) - What spawns in your off hand? *Reset Equipment On Game Start (Toggle) - Put equipment back at their cleanup positions on game start *Broken Equipment (Respawn/Hide/Destroy) - What does the game do to items which have durability after they break? *Infinite Reserve Ammunition (Toggle) - Applies to the Laser Tag power weapons (Sorry, no ammunition system yet!) *Unequipped Item Ring Effect (Toggle) - Should weapons lying around have the glowing ring around them? (Like paintball) *Out Of Bounds Restrictions (Toggle) - If enabled, warn and respawn players who go out of bounds. *Out Of Bounds Grace Period - How long after going out of bounds should a player get a warning? *Out Of Bounds Max Duration - How long can someone be out of bounds before they are downed? *Down Out Of Bounds Players - Should players be downed for going out of bounds? Many of you are likely very excited by the large degree of customization these options afford, and we are too! We think that exposing all of these things to creators will allow you to build things that, dare I say it, impress us even more than what's already out there. We're stoked to get it out to you soon. If you've got questions on any of these - what they do, what they don't do - post a reply and we'll do our best to elaborate. We're sorry that this update is taking a bit longer than usual, but hang in there! We think it'll be worth the wait! The next update - preview of new creation tools March 5, 2019 - gribbly We've been hard at work on next update, and it's almost cooked! We're deep into the testing and bug-fixing phase (yes, we do fix bugs!) so it's "some small number of days" away... we're not quite sure how many. While we wait for the bug fixes, I wanted to provide a preview of the new creation features that are in this update. There's a bunch of new stuff. In some cases the changes may require some tweaks to your existing rooms - we've worked hard to avoid this for the most part. I've listed the known issues at the bottom, and our ongoing testing is largely about squeezing out any remaining issues. Before I get to the details, let me talk about update frequency. Traditionally we've shipped an update every two weeks or so, but we're going a little slower right now. This is because a big chunk of the team (especially the art team) is super busy adapting the game for new platforms. It's a bunch of work, but the results are very exciting =] More on all that soon... point is we'll get back to our two week update schedule once we're done. OK, let's get into the new creation tools... strap in because there's a lot to talk about! (BTW, we'll be posting How To videos for many of these features when the update arrives) *We've updated the shape bevels (i.e., what the edges look like)! Shape bevels are now "smart" - they are not simply scaled with the shape. The net result is that large shapes now have sharper edges, a much requested adjustment. This will not affect existing rooms, but newly-created shapes will have the new bevel behavior. It won't be in for this update, but we are likely to add a new "soft cube" shape so you can still have the rounder "soft" bevels on large objects if that's what you want. Please give us feedback once the update is out - we're keen to hear what you think of the new behavior. *We've added a new "State Machine" chip. This makes it really easy to manage any kind of state behavior... whether it's as simple as "door open/door closed" or as complex as managing the states for a custom game mode. We realized that a big chunk of game programming is basically implementing and controlling state machines, so we wanted to make it much faster and easier to work with this important concept in Rec Room. The State Machine chip is extremely powerful, we recommend anyone interested in implementing custom behaviors check it out! Find it in Maker Pen > Palette > Gadgets > Other Chips. *We've added the ability to pack your circuits into "Circuit Boards". This makes large, unruly collections of wired-together chips into a single neat Circuit Board object. You can pack/unpack circuits using the same "Edit/Done Editing" flow as editing Maker Pen shapes. Packing your chips into a Circuit Board makes them a bit cheaper (saving you some ink), and definitely makes it easier to keep things organized! *Circuit Boards also let you protect your circuits when sharing them as an Invention - if you include a Circuit Board in a "Use Only" Invention, other players aren't able to unpack it. So they can't see or change the circuit, but they can use it. *We've added a new "Game Rules" chip that exposes a bunch of the internal Rec Room game systems for use in your rooms. This includes stuff like health, HUDs, reviving rules, spawning with/without various kinds of equipment, team radios, etc. In all there are 19 pages (!) of settings for you to tweak. You can find the Game Rules chip in Maker Pen > Palette > Gadgets > Other Gadgets. Use the Maker Pen "Configure" tool to access the settings. *You can have multiple Game Rules chips in your room. Each one will appear as a mode on the scoreboard. The mode selected on the scoreboard will correspond to the active Game Rules chip. *Scoreboards are now proper sandbox props... so you can move them, delete them, add new ones, scale them. *There's a new Scoreboard Setup chip that lets you rename the scoring units in your room if you want something other than the standard "point". *We've upgraded the Sampler - you can now specify start and end offsets for much tighter control over your sounds. You can also specify which channel it will play through (SFX, music, voice, ambient) which means it will respect player settings (e.g., if you've got music turned down in settings, Samplers playing in that channel will also be turned down). *There's a new Beacon object, perfect for highlighting objectives in your games! Place and scale it like any prop, then you can use circuit inputs to dynamically control the height, color and visibility of the beacon. *SFX chip now has a volume setting in its Config menu. *There's a new "Player Revive" chip. It works like the Player Hit chip - it sends a circuit signal (including player ID) whenever a player is revived. *Breakable objects (like plates, bottles, jugs) now respawn by default. If you want them to break forever, tweak that setting in the new Game Rules chip. *Laser weapons are now the PvP-tweaked Laser Tag variants (rather than the Jumbotron variants). This won't affect existing placements, but new placements will use the new variants. *Trigger volumes are now player role-aware. Here are some important things to know about the transition to the new “Game Rule chip” based system: *For new rooms, you’ll need to manually add a Game Rule chip. *Existing rooms will automatically have a Game Rule chip next to the scoreboard, with relevant settings automatically applied. If you’re not running any game logic in your room, it’s safe to delete this chip. *Rooms cloned from Rec Room Originals and customized via the Game Setup menu (which no longer exists), will need their settings re-applied via the Game Rules chip that has been spawned next to the scoreboard. So if you cloned ^Paintball and tweaked it to spawn players with bows, you’ll need to make that change again and re-save your room. Sorry about that, but it takes only a minute and it unlocks huge amounts of new stuff for you to play with! *If you were using the old “Game Duration” setting in the (now defunct) Game Setup menu, you’ll need to re-configure this using the new Scoreboard Setup chip. *We are testing existing rooms with the new tools to make sure everything keeps working seamlessly. If you own a popular room we may reach out to you to work with you if we find an issue. You can also just reply in this thread if you have any concerns and I’ll check it over the next couple of days to answer questions! OK that's it! Looking forward to shipping the new update ASAP... BTW there's more in it that just the list above... I'm staying focused on creation stuff today =] Rec Room MINI UPDATE for the “Published Inventions” Edition! February 14, 2019 - magglerock We're stoked to announce that Rec Tokens are (finally =P) available for purchase on Steam and Oculus (coming soon for PlayStation®)! *While playing via Steam or Oculus, find Rec Tokens for purchase in your Watch > Store > Get Tokens *Note that due to Sony policies, Rec Tokens purchased on PC and items purchased with Rec Tokens on PC won't be accessible on PlayStation® (and vice versa) - though earned items will always be available on all platforms! *If you have any issues with a purchase, please reach out to tokens@againstgrav.com Plus we've got some updates to the screen mode Quick Select menu: *While playing in screens mode, hold the "Backpack" button (Triangle, Y, or ~ depending on your platform) to see the tools you have equipped. *Move the left stick and release the button to swap to that tool. *This also includes quick access to the share camera, maker pen, and Rec Royale map. *Tapping the Backpack button will switch tools as usual. And a few bug fixes to round it out =] *Bulletin boards no longer render on top of the watch menu! *Fixed a bug that allowed you to fire guns through walls, fences, etc. *Fixed a bug where taking a picture to publish a room would freeze the game Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://www.againstgrav.com/community/ Thanks for playing Rec Room! As always, don't hesitate to give us your feedback =] Rec Room UPDATE - the “Published Inventions” Edition! February 7, 2019 - magglerock This is a super exciting update for us - check out what's new: *You can now publish your Inventions to share with other players! *There's a new Inventions tab in the store, where you can find Inventions published by other players and download them to your Maker Pen palette! *When you publish an Invention, you can choose what permissions it has (giving you control over how other players can use it). The permissions are: *Publish (the default): Other players can make major changes to this Invention, then publish the result as a new Invention. Choose this permission if you’re cool with variations of your Invention being published in the store. *Use Only: Other players can’t make major changes to this Invention. They also can’t create a new Invention that contains any part of it. Choose this permission if you want don’t want people copying/modifying your Invention. *Edit and Save: Other players can make major changes to this Invention, but they can’t create a new Invention that contains any part of it. Use this permission if you don’t mind people adapting your Invention for your needs, but you don’t want them to republish the changes. *You can also set permissions on an Invention without publishing it first - find this in the Invention's Setup menu! Screen mode creation has had a major revision to make it easier and more fun to create with! We'd love to hear feedback on it! *You now use the Maker Pen in first person and have access to the majority of the building tools and options (there are some missing pieces yet, we'll clean them up soon...) *Follow the onscreen prompts for the various buttons and options! *Like in VR mode, if you fly while holding the maker pen you can clip through objects. This makes building much easier! Plus a few other fun creation updates: *We're excited to share the new self-scaling tool! This is experimental and only in VR so far, but we're excited to hear what you think! You can toggle this mode on in the Maker Pen Palette > Settings menu, and use the grip triggers on Oculus/Vive, and upper outer buttons on PSVR (left hand square, right hand triangle)! *The Maker Pen tubes got some major updates! Set the number of sides, the roundness and the width of your drawings. Keep connecting to the end of tubes for precise creations and use the manipulate tool to move control points around for that final tweak. But wait, there's more! Screen mode players can now fly! *Access to flying is configured exactly the same as for VR players (i.e., it's a Room permission). *To start or stop flying, double tap the jump button. *If you want to try it out, here's the incredibly intuitive and easy process to enable flying in your Dorm Room: Open your Watch, tap This Room > Setup > Roles, then tap the gear icon for "Dorm Room". In the Shared settings, tap Override on the "Can Fly" option, then move the slider to "Yes". You may want to save the room after doing this so you don't have to do it again! Could this flow be made simpler? Nope. This is fine. *We now have to keep updating this flow, it's totally fine And that's not all! *All quests are now in first person mode for screens players! *The Report Player screen got an ease of use update - there are now dropdowns with canned report categories! *The Code of Conduct got a spruce =] *Melee weapons in Isle of the Lost Skulls now automatically lock to your hands Plus a bunch of bug fixes, including: *A bunch of PS4 crash mitigations! Let us know if you continue to experience performance problems on PS4. *Fixed issue that would cause all room saves in a room session to spin indefinitely *Added back snapping and shape preview for trigger volumes *Fixed some bugs with the layout of dorm dresser items Please see here for convenient links to controls, tutorials, comfort options, etc.: https://www.againstgrav.com/community/ Thanks for playing Rec Room! As always, don't hesitate to give us your feedback =] See the News Archive for older news. Category:Miscellaneous